A Dyson sphere is a hypothetical megastructure that encompasses a star and captures a large percentage of its power output. The concept is a thought experiment that attempts to imagine how a spacefaring civilization would meet its energy requirements once those requirements exceed what can be generated from the home planet’s resources alone. Because only a tiny fraction of a star’s energy emissions reaches the surface of any orbiting planet, building structures encircling a star would enable a civilization to harvest far more energy.
They only work during the day though.
This is what they said about solar panels too, maybe it’ll work out.
I believe they were making a joke because if you wrap this thing around a star there really is no day night cycle because it’s all star. Our day night cycle comes because we are spinning.
If you want to make one you can.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1366540/Dyson_Sphere_Program/
Damn that looks cool
If you think it’s cool, you should try the game :)
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1366540/Dyson_Sphere_Program/
That’s crazy that they made this hypothesis based on a steam game
I think freeman Dyson beat em to the punch by several decades :)
The game is truly great though.
Some TIL posts really surprise you, it’s crazy to me that you have never heard about this. Not being degrading or anything like that, it’s just surprising.
One of today’s lucky 100000
Yeah never heard about it, although I never watched Star Trek personally.
But did you know that we can extract Graphene by heating it up super high so that everything else gets destroyed except graphene?
Read the bobiverse and you’ll come across a topopolis. The pictures on wiki suck so here’s one from fiction.
I didn’t know that! You keep sharing the hits! Keep it coming!
Eh, there’s only one in all of Star Trek, and they forgot about it after one episode. Should have a whole series.
There was a star trek novel dealing with it. I read it but don’t remember any details. My favorite along those lines was the ringworld books.
Be carful with those. You may block the light of constellation aliens use and really piss then off.
excellent stellaris reference! ;)
Eh, they won’t find out until a few centuries later anyway
Well unless they are monitoring or are relatively close. The issue was they got annoyed cause their decedendants won’t see their “holy constellation”. Something like a north star to them I guess. So anyway I started a purification campaign In response.
…no, they won’t know for a few hundred years due to the actual speed of light and vast distances of space.
Unless they have some fancy alien sensor with quantum entangled particles so they get an alert instantly
You’re assuming they are not part of the deep state already!
It’s a Stellaris reference. Once you can build Dyson spheres there’s a chance your (also FTL capable) neighbors complain about you blocking their sacred star.
I usually just give them money and they forgive me.
Just put them in the Synaptic Lathe and forget about them.
Certainly humane than livestock.
“People of Earth, I am Lrrr of the planet Omicron Persei 8.”
Is dark matter just Dyson sphered stars?
While the idea is charming, a Dyson sphere itself would still consist of matter and as such it would emit radiation according to its temperature (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_radiation). And since it surrounds a star it is heated from the inside and would definitely emit radiation that can be detected. Dark Matter is missing this radiation part and is only observed by its gravitation.
So the answer is no, unfortunately.
Edit to add disclaimer: this is shitpost level math here guys, I’m just spitballing.
It would definitely emit thermal radiation. if it was 99% efficient and the size of pluto’s orbit, around a star like the sun, and the energy was used to create matter, I think it would radiate the remaining energy as 0.009 W/m2 with a peak emission wavelength of 150micrometers. The James Webb telescope has infrared capabilities that max out at 28.5 micrometers so def not detectable.
But probably a dyson sphere would be smaller than pluto’s orbit, which would greatly increase the apparent power, and shorten the wavelength. idk it’s all imaginary.
I won’t subject you to my hand writing but I did (power of sun × 0.01)/(surface area of sphere with Pluto’s orbital radius) to get radiation intensity (0.009 W/m2). Then rearranged Stefan-Boltzmann law to solve for temperature (19.8K). Then used Wien’s Displacement Law to calculate the peak wavelength (1.5×10-4 m).
Maybe I’ll run the numbers again with a martian orbit radius, and 50% efficiency.
Okay I did the same calculation but with Martian orbit as dyson sphere size, and 50% efficiency I got a wavelength of 3.4um so nicely in the infrared range of JWST.
I think the sphere would need to be like 99.95% efficient to be undetectable by JWST at Martian orbit radius.
My initial reaction: “What? No.”
After thinking a little bit: “hmm I guess you could say that…”
Like I’m sure it’s not but I don’t know if it’s a worse explanation than any of the other ideas being considered. But I don’t know enough to even know how wrong I am.
Start with a dyson ring or swarm
I don’t remember the math, but you lose return on investment after a certain percentage of coverage.
Dyson Grids are the future!!! 😜
The other “benefit” to the sphere is blacking out a star. Other life, should it exist, is less likely to find the structure. ITT people destroying my dreams of a big shelly boi
I would think it’d make it more likely that you’re discovered when you turn your star into a black ball with a gigantic IR signature where a star should be. Any civilization with a cursory understanding of gravity and stellar spectra would turn every telescope they have on you.
What does IR red shift into over cosmic distances? But it would be just as, if not less, noticeable as a star suddenly dimming to [100%-optimal capture rate]
Deeper IR, microwave and radio. Within a galaxy, redshift can be ignored. In another galaxy, the issue is moot, you don’t need to worry about them and they don’t need to worry about you.
Our current scopes can pick up brown dwarfs with a surface temperature below freezing. An object the diameter of a planetary orbit, with the gravitational effect of a main sequence star and giving off just black body radiation is gonna stick out like a neon “Interesting stuff here!” sign the moment someone does a long wavelength survey of your general region.
Even if you build a swarm instead of a solid shell, you’re still going to shift the star’s apparent spectrum towards IR, from the swarm radiating waste heat. A star whose mass, diameter and emission spectrum don’t match up with the math is inviting investigation, regardless of how you try to mask what you’ve been doing.
The gravity from the star will also still be there regardless of how much of its EM signature is visible outside of the sphere.
Ouh! Love me some “Dark Forest hypothesis” existential dread 😁
Wouldn’t we cook in the end if you don’t let out residual em?
That’s why you build a ringworld instead.
Or DYson Bubbles, which would also “cover” enough “surface” to be viable without needing god knows how many planets’ worth of material
I like the idea of a dyson swarm
Kind of looks like an atom
You need to watch more Star Trek, friend.
Specifically “The Next Generation”, Season 6, Episode 4, " Relics".
Thank me later. 😁
No bloody A B C or D
Classic episode; one of my favorite
With a bottle of green.
There is also the Matrioshka brain, a hypothetical supercomputer powered by a Dyson sphere
Ok this one’s new to me!
Came here to say that if you like this concept, Peter Hamilton has a book series called Commonwealth Saga in the science fiction category that is excellent. Lots of pseudoscience from early 2000s in that series.
Great author!
Okay but where does the invisible hand dryer go?
You might like this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pP44EPBMb8A about how to build one from Earth.
Wait! The same problem Larry Niven’s Ringworld have also applies to Dyson Spheres? Huh! Saving to read later.
